Yesterday, Konami released its financial results for the first six months of its fiscal year, announcing increased revenue over the same six months in 2005, but an overall decrease in net profit.
For the half-year ending on September 30, Konami raked in a net revenue of 119.6 billion yen ($1 billion), an increase from last year's first-half total of 111.9 billion yen (about $951 million). Unfortunately, the company's costs didn't allow them to keep much of that $1 billion this year, as its net income for the first six months in 2006 was down to 5.1 billion yen ($43 million). In the same period last year, Konami posted a net income of nearly 7 billion yen ($59 million).
Still, it's important to remember that last year's big profit was mostly driven by a 6.9 billion yen ($58 million) sale of its stake in Takara, which represented more than 22% of the entire company. If you don't include this big business transaction, Konami's profit actually increased along with its revenues for the first six months of this year.
On the other hand, the publisher's sales and profits were both down for the digital entertainment division (it includes gaming operations). The division took in 63.5 billion yen ($540 million), down from 66.7 billion yen ($567 million) for the April-September period last year, and profits fell year-over-year from 13 billion yen ($110 million) to 11.4 billion yen ($97 million).
Konami cited the latest installments in the Winning Eleven and Jikkyou Pawafuru Puro Yakyu baseball series as solid performers, and the North American sales of the popular Dance Dance Revolution SuperNOVA were identified as "firm." Obviously, they didn't have a Metal Gear Solid to help out this time around, so maybe that'll have an impact next year.